RAIPUR: A train chugged off where it wasn't supposed to, railways suffered a Rs 3-crore loss, a station master was suspended, and a divorce battle dragged on for 12 years from Visakhapatnam to Supreme Court and Chhattisgarh's Durg - because of a cursory 'OK'. The station master had ended an angry phone call with his wife with the word, but it was mistaken for a go-ahead to send a train into Maoist territory, triggering this stranger-than-fiction chain of events. The station master hails from Visakhapatnam and his now divorced wife is from Durg.
Court evidence shows they married on Oct 12, 2011, but the bride was unhappy due to her past relationship with another man, and her confession that she wasn't over it. This led to friction at home. Train’s journey into Maoist-hit area cost Railways Rs3cr The stationmaster appealed to her parents, who gave assurances, but the woman never stopped communicating with her lover.
She would call him even with her husband sleeping right next to her. The marriage was already hanging by a thread when, one night, she called the stationmaster when he was on duty and they again quarrelled. Since he was at work, he ended the call by saying, "We'll talk at home, OK?" He didn't realise that his work microphone was on.
His colleague on the other end only heard the 'OK' and mistook it as the green signal to dispatch a freight train down a restricted route in a Maoist-affected area. Thankfully, there was no accident, yet it was a violation of night-tim.
